Star trail in the context of "Long-exposure photography"

In astronomy, diurnal motion (from Latin diurnus 'daily', from Latin diēs 'day') is the apparent motion of celestial objects (e.g. the Sun and stars) around Earth, or more precisely around the two celestial poles, over the course of one day. It is caused by Earth's rotation around its axis, so almost every star appears to follow a circular arc path, called the diurnal circle, often depicted in star trail photography.

The time for one complete rotation is 23 hours, 56 minutes, and 4.09 seconds – one sidereal day. The first experimental demonstration of this motion was conducted by Léon Foucault. Because Earth orbits the Sun once a year, the sidereal time at any given place and time will gain about four minutes against local civil time, every 24 hours, until, after a year has passed, one additional sidereal "day" has elapsed compared to the number of solar days that have gone by.

A pole star is a visible star that is approximately aligned with the axis of rotation of an astronomical body; that is, a star whose apparent position is close to one of the celestial poles. On Earth, a pole star would lie directly overhead when viewed from the North or the South Pole.

Currently, Earth's pole stars are Polaris (Alpha Ursae Minoris), a bright magnitude 2 star aligned approximately with its northern axis that serves as a pre-eminent star in celestial navigation, and a much dimmer magnitude 5.5 star on its southern axis, Polaris Australis (Sigma Octantis).

A circumpolar star is a star that, as viewed from a given latitude on Earth, never sets below the horizon due to its apparent proximity to one of the celestial poles. Circumpolar stars are therefore visible from said location toward the nearest pole for the entire night on every night of the year (and would be continuously visible throughout the day too, were they not overwhelmed by the Sun's glare). Others are called seasonal stars.

All circumpolar stars lie within a circumpolar circle whose size is determined by the observer's latitude. Specifically, the angular measure of the radius of this circle equals the observer's latitude. The closer the observer is to the North or South Pole, the larger its circumpolar circle.

A geostationary orbit, also referred to as a (GEO), is a circular geosynchronous orbit 35,786 km (22,236 mi) in altitude above Earth's equator, 42,164 km (26,199 mi) in radius from Earth's center, and following the direction of Earth's rotation.

An object in such an orbit has an orbital period equal to Earth's rotational period, one sidereal day, and so to ground observers it appears motionless, in a fixed position in the sky. The concept of a geostationary orbit was popularised by the science fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke in the 1940s as a way to revolutionise telecommunications, and the first satellite to be placed in this kind of orbit was launched in 1963.

Motion blur is the apparent streaking of moving objects in a photograph or a sequence of frames, such as a film or animation. It results when the image being recorded changes during the recording of a single exposure, due to rapid movement or long exposure.